Luis Tiant (1940-2024), the Cuban Dervish

Even in an era brimming with colorful characters and exceptional hurlers, Luis Tiant stood out. The barrel-chested, mustachioed Cuban righty combined an assortment of exaggerated deliveries with a variety of arm angles and speeds that baffled hitters — and tantalized writers — over the course of a 19-year major league career (1964–82) and an affiliation with the game in one capacity or another that extended through the remainder of his life. “The Cuban Dervish,” as Sports Illustrated’s Ron Fimrite christened him in 1975, died last Tuesday at the age of 83. No cause of death was announced.

The son of a legendary left-hander colloquially known as Luis Tiant Sr., the younger Tiant was exiled from his home country in the wake of Cuban prime minister Fidel Castro’s travel restrictions, and separated from his family for 14 years. Against that backdrop of isolation, “El Tiante” went on to become the winningest Cuban-born pitcher in major league history, and to emerge as a larger-than-life character, so inseparable from his trademark cigars that he chomped them even in postgame showers. He spoke softly in a thick accent, but that didn’t prevent his wit and wisdom from getting across, particularly during the latter half of his career, after he emerged from a serious arm injury to become a top big-game pitcher. “In boots, black cap, foot-long cigar and nothing else, he’d hold court with half-hour monologues Richard Pryor would envy,” wrote Thomas Boswell in 1988.

Tiant’s ascendence to iconic status centered around his 1971–78 run with the Red Sox, reaching its pinnacle in their seven-game 1975 World Series defeat, during which he made three starts: a brilliant Game 1 shutout; a gritty Game 4 complete game during which he delivered “163 pitches in 100 ways,” to use the description of Sports Illustrated‘s Roy Blount Jr.; and a valiant, draining Game 6 effort where he faltered late but was saved by Carlton Fisk’s famous body-English home run around Fenway Park’s left field foul pole in the 12th inning.

The Red Sox lost Game 7, but that postseason cemented Tiant’s place within the cultural pantheon. “Black-bearded and sinister, he looks like Pancho Villa after a tough week of looting and burning,” wrote Red Smith for the New York Times after Tiant held the three-time defending champion A’s to three hits and one unearned run in American League Championship Series opener. “He works without waste of time or motion, glowering briefly into the sun to take the catcher’s sign, pivoting on one leg to face center field, then wheeling back to deliver over the top. He is a master of every legal pitch and he never throws two consecutive pitches at the same speed.”

“Tiant is the Fred Astaire of baseball,” marveled Oakland’s Reggie Jackson after that same start. The Boston Globe‘s Peter Gammons called him “a hero of unmatched emotional majesty” after his Game 6 effort. The New Yorker’s Roger Angell catalogued “the full range of Tiantic mime” in “Agincourt and After,” perhaps the most well-loved dispatch of his 60-year career. His half-dozen descriptions take flight thusly: “(1) Call the Osteopath: In midpitch the man suffers an agonizing seizure in the central cervical region, which he attempts to fight off with a sharp backward twist of the head.”

Beyond the mythology was a master craftsman whose repertoire of four basic pitches (fastball, curve, slider, and changeup) combined with three angles (over-the-top, three-quarters, and sidearm) and six different speeds for the curve and change yielded 20 distinct offerings according to Fisk. Before reaching the Red Sox, Tiant attained stardom during a six-season run with the then Indians (1964–69), during which he turned in his most dominant season in 1968, then his worst the year after. A brief stop with the Twins (1970) was marred by a fractured scapula, but led to his unlikely re-emergence with the Red Sox. Afterwards, he bounced around to the Yankees (1979–80), Pirates (’81), and Angels (’82) before returning to the Mexican League. For his career, he won 229 games and lost 172 with a 3.30 ERA (114 ERA+), 49 shutouts, and 2,416 strikeouts — excellent numbers but ones that have yet to convince Hall of Fame voters to grant him admission.

Luis Clemente Tiant y Vega was born November 23, 1940 in Marianao, Cuba, the only child of Luis Eleuterio Tiant and his wife, Isabel Vega Tiant. The senior Tiant (b. 1906, La Habana, Cuba) was an accomplished pitcher in his own right, a left-hander whose opportunity to play in the National or American Leagues was denied because of the color of his skin. Instead, in a professional career that spanned from 1926–48, he pitched in Cuba, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and the Negro Leagues, most notably starring for the New York Cubans, and pitching in East-West All-Star Games in 1935 and ’47. Listed at 5-foot-10 and 150 pounds, and nicknamed “Sir Skinny,” he was renowned for his corkscrew delivery and his screwball. In 1935, he won two games facing the barnstorming Babe Ruth All-Stars, and held the Bambino to one hit. In 1947, his final season in the Negro National League, he went 9-0 with a 2.37 ERA in 79.2 innings for a Cubans team that won the Negro League World Series.

The younger Tiant never saw his father play in the United States, but did watch him pitch in the Cuban Winter League and against barnstorming major league teams. Stateside, the elder Tiant encountered the racism and bigotry — not to mention the wearying travel — of his Negro Leagues compatriots. As his son got older and displayed talent of his own, the father discouraged him from going to the U.S., saying, “I didn’t want him to be persecuted and spit on and treated like garbage like I was.”

But Tiant’s mother championed her son’s nascent career. As a 16-year-old, he traveled to Mexico City to play in an international tournament, and at 18, in 1959, he tried out for the Havana Sugar Kings, an International League affiliate of the Reds. He missed the cut, but former All-Star second baseman-turned-scout Bobby Avila instead signed him for the Mexico City Tigers of the Mexican League. Tiant struggled his first year (5-19, 5.92 ERA) but improved in each of his next two seasons, returning to Havana to play winter ball.

Politics soon interfered with his career. In the wake of the Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961, Castro’s crackdown prevented the 21-year-old Tiant from reporting to Mexico City until May 25. On August 12, 1961, he married Maria del Refugio Navarro, whom he planned to take to meet his parents in Cuba in September before honeymooning, until his father wrote a letter to his son:

“Don’t come home… Castro is not going to allow any more professional sports here — no baseball or boxing. If you do come home, I don’t think you’ll be able to get out again. They are not letting many people leave the island, especially young men of military age. Just make a life in Mexico for you and your family. I’ll let you know when you can come home.”

“He knew how much baseball meant to me, as it had to him, and he wanted me to reach the top — no matter what,” recalled the younger Tiant in 2019. Though briefly visited by his mother in Mexico City in 1968 while his father was jailed in Cuba in order to assure her return, it would take another seven years to reunite with both parents.

While Castro shut down the Cuban Winter League and began nationalizing the sport, Tiant instead spent the winter pitching in Puerto Rico, where he caught the eye of Julio “Monchy” de Arco, a Cuban League executive who additionally scouted for Cleveland. The team purchased Tiant’s contract from Mexico City for $25,000, but the pitcher didn’t get a dime. He spent the next three seasons in the minors, improving at every stop but encountering racism, segregation, and the language barrier, particularly while pitching for teams in Charleston, West Virginia in 1962 and Burlington, North Carolina in ’63 (“I couldn’t speak very good English but I understand racism. They treated me like a dog,” he recalled in 2010). Despite throwing a no-hitter for Burlington while leading the Carolina League with 207 strikeouts, 17 complete games, and six shutouts, he was left off Cleveland’s 40-man roster that winter; while starring in the Venezuela Winter League, he could have been claimed for $12,000 in the Rule 5 draft, but no team bit. “I blew one when I didn’t protect Tiant from the draft at the winter meetings,” said a relieved Gabe Paul, Cleveland’s president and general manager.

In 1964 with Portland of the Pacific Coast League, the 23-year-old Tiant went 15-1 with a 2.04 ERA and 154 strikeouts in 137 innings despite beginning the season in the bullpen. From L.H. Gregory in the The Sporting News:

“[A] husky, big-chested fellow… Tiant doesn’t speak much English — just enough to make an occasional unexpected witty remark in the clubhouse. However, besides his native Spanish, he speaks a language every baseball player knows and respects — that of the overpowering fast ball. When he’s on the mound, it’s boom, boom, boom from the first inning through the ninth… He owns a fine slider and now and then throws a surprisingly good curve, but his best pitch is his fast ball.

Cleveland called him up to debut on July 19 opposite Whitey Ford in Yankee Stadium. In the nightcap of a doubleheader, he threw a four-hit, four-walk shutout, striking out 11, with Roger Maris among those rung up multiple times; Mickey Mantle did not play. More strong starts followed, including four-hit shutouts against the Angels in Los Angeles and the Red Sox in Boston. He finished 10-4 with a 2.83 ERA and nine complete games in 16 starts.

Cleveland didn’t place higher than fifth in the 10-team AL during Tiant’s tenure until 1968, when they jumped from 75 wins to 86. The team did not lack for good arms, with Sam McDowell (two years younger than Tiant) the best of the bunch, Steve Hargan (also two years younger) and Sonny Siebert both quite effective, and Tommy John struggling to crack the rotation. Thus from 1965–67, Tiant spent considerable time in the bullpen, averaging 40 appearances, 25 starts, 188 innings, 172 strikeouts and a 3.03 ERA (113 ERA+), with won-loss records that were hardly eye-catching (11-11, 12-11, 12-9).

Bouts of arm soreness factored into his shuttling, and his increasing weight drew comment. “Everybody say I look fat. Maybe because uniform not fit so gud,” read one small part of a cringeworthy transliteration of his fractured English circa January 1965. A March 1966 Sporting News article noted that he reported to camp at 181 pounds, 20 lighter than the previous season.

In 1968, “The Year of the Pitcher,” Tiant broke out, going 21-9 while leading in WAR (8.5 via Baseball Reference, the source for all such figures herein) as well as shutouts (nine), ERA (1.60), and ERA+ (186). From April 28–May 17, he threw 41 consecutive scoreless innings, a streak still tied for ninth all-time. In a 10-inning game on July 3 against the Twins, he fanned 19 and won 1-0. He threw four three-hit complete games, plus a two-hitter and, on September 25, in his first start after being briefly sidelined by a strained tendon in his elbow, a one-hitter against the Yankees in Yankee Stadium.

Key to this success was his increasingly elaborate and deceptive deliveries. As described in The Sporting News by Russell Schneider:

“Tiant has a herky-jerky style to begin with, but now he throws his arms around, cork-screws his body as he winds, tosses his head this way and that, looks back to left or center field, kicks his foot, flaps his glove, and, from the midst of everything, here comes the baseball.

“The motion depends on how I feel,” explained Looie. “And how I think the hitter is thinking. Sometimes I do nothing but throw the ball. You can’t use the motions too much or they will get used to it.”

Tiant made his first All-Star team that year, and in most years his numbers would have been good enough to win a Cy Young, but 1968 saw Denny McLain go 31-5 with a 1.96 ERA and 336 innings to Tiant’s 258.1. The Tigers’ ace additionally helped his team to a pennant and a championship, and not surprisingly won the award unanimously, just as Bob Gibson and his 1.12 ERA did in the NL. Tiant might have been runner-up in the AL, but the voting, which had been done in separate leagues for the first time just the year before, still allowed for just one pitcher per ballot.

Even within that stellar campaign, the seeds of Tiant’s downfall were sown. When Tiant was shelved, manager Alvin Dark publicly blamed his “extreme motions” for his arm trouble, a criticism that would resurface. At the request of Paul and Dark, Tiant bypassed pitching in the winter, but in early 1969 complained that his arm felt weak due to the rust. The lowered mound and shrunken strike zone, rule changes designed to boost offense, didn’t help. Neither did Dark, who complained, “You can’t throw your head up into the air, then look over the scoreboard and then pitch a baseball.” Tiant finished just 9-20 with a 3.71 ERA (101 ERA+) while yielding the league’s highest walk and homer totals (129 and 37, respectively); Cleveland tumbled to 62-99.

In December 1969, Tiant was traded to the Twins in a six-player deal that included ’64 Cy Young winner Dean Chance and future star third baseman Graig Nettles heading to Cleveland. Tiant started 6-0 with a 3.12 ERA, but a bout of shoulder soreness soon revealed itself to be a fractured scapula, an injury then unseen in pitchers, and led to the call-up of 19-year-old phenom Bert Blyleven. Tiant missed two months and then made just one start after September 7. The Twins, who featured future Hall of Famers Blyleven, Jim Kaat, Rod Carew, and Tony Oliva, took the AL West with 98 wins but were swept by the Orioles in the ALCS. In his only postseason appearance, Tiant came out of the bullpen during the ninth inning of Game 2 with the Twins down five runs and served up a three-run homer to Davey Johnson.

He never pitched another competitive game for Minnesota. Hampered by a pulled muscle in his rib cage, Tiant pitched sparingly during spring training in 1971, and was released on March 31; Twins owner Calvin Griffith believed the 30-year-old righty was cooked. After he spent a month with the Braves’ Triple-A Richmond affiliate, he was released again, then signed with the Red Sox two days later. They called him up in June after he pitched well for their Triple-A Louisville squad.

Tiant did not take Boston by storm initially. Debuting against the Royals, he was tagged for five runs and was pulled before recording an out in the second inning. He threw 10 shutout innings against the Twins on July 15, but failed to last five innings too often, spent August and September on mop-up duty, and finished 1-7 with a 4.85 ERA in 72.1 innings. Surprisingly, the Red Sox kept him on the roster over the winter, but he had a believer in manager Eddie Kasko, who found room for him in the bullpen thanks to the trade of Sparky Lyle to the Yankees. Pitching in relief with the occasional spot start, he put up a 3.02 ERA in 27 first-half appearances.

In August 1972, Tiant moved to the rotation and flourished. On August 19, he threw 6 2/3 no-hit innings and finished with a two-hit shutout, the first of a streak of four straight during which he allowed just 16 hits and seven walks while striking out 31. With his 40 consecutive scoreless innings in a span that stretched into his September 8 start, he became (and remains) the only pitcher besides Walter Johnson with two scoreless streaks of at least 40 innings. The Fenway faithful fell in love, chanting “Loo-Eee, Loo-Eee, Loo-Eee” as Tiant recorded his third shutout of the month (and sixth of the season) against Baltimore on September 20. “If 1967 was the summer of Carl Yastrzemski in Boston, 1972 has become the summer of Luis Tiant… For the baseball fans of Boston, Tiant has become the folk hero,” wrote the Boston Herald American’s Larry Clafin.

Tiant’s season ended on a down note. Starting against the AL East-leading Tigers on the season’s penultimate day with the Red Sox trailing by half a game — the league didn’t make up games lost to the spring players’ strike, even if it left teams with unequal schedules — he allowed three runs in 6 1/3 innings of a 3-1 loss, and the Red Sox were eliminated. Still, he finished 15-6 with a league-best 1.91 ERA in 179 innings, and placed sixth in the Cy Young voting and eighth in the MVP voting. His career had new life.

Tiant turned in strong seasons in 1973 (20-13, 3.34 ERA, 206 strikeouts, 5.3 WAR) and ’74 (22-13, 2.92 ERA, 176 strikeouts, 7.7 WAR). In the latter year, he made his second All-Star team, tied for fourth in the Cy Young voting, and finished 11th in the MVP voting. The Red Sox won 89 games and finished second to the Orioles in 1973, but blew a seven-game lead in ’74, going 14-24 after August 23 and slipping to third with just 84 wins. During a four-start stretch from August 28–September 10, Tiant allowed seven runs in 34 innings across four starts, but the Red Sox scored just one run in the entire span, going 0-4.

Boston finally won the AL East in 1975, a subpar season for Tiant, who dealt with back problems and went 18-14 with a 4.02 ERA (103 ERA+) and just 2.5 WAR. He was preoccupied with his family situation. In May 1975, while meeting with Castro in Cuba, Senator George McGovern presented a letter from Massachusetts senator Edward Brooke making a personal plea to allow Tiant’s parents to visit their son in Boston.

“Luis’s career as a major league pitcher is in its latter years. It is impossible to predict how much longer he will be able to pitch. Therefore, it is hopeful that his parents will be able to visit him in Boston during this current baseball season,” wrote Brooke, who added that he had secured the necessary visas. Castro quickly approved the request, even allowing them an indefinite stay. On August 26, 69-year-old Luis Sr. threw out a ceremonial first pitch in front of a packed Fenway Park, and received a lengthy ovation. His son’s performance (six runs, five innings, and a loss) put a mild damper on the occasion, and after he departed his next start in the third inning, he was shut down for 10 days.

Fortunately, the Red Sox, who again led the AL East by seven games, held on, and Tiant rebounded in his return. On September 11 against the Tigers, he threw 7 2/3 no-hit innings, struck out 10, and finished with a three-hit, one-run complete game. Five- and four-hit shutouts followed, broken up by one early exit. His Game 1 ALCS shutout kicked off a three-game sweep, and a week later he started the World Series opener against the Reds at Fenway, spinning a five-hit shutout and sparking a six-run rally with a leadoff single off Don Gullett in the seventh inning.

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Luis Tiant’s memorable trip around the bases during the 1975 World Series ?

RIP Luis ? pic.twitter.com/tWHz0L2TT1

— Codify (@CodifyBaseball) October 8, 2024

Tiant returned on three days rest for Game 4 in Cincinnati, and, lacking his typical command of his breaking balls, nonetheless gutted out a complete game, during which he allowed nine hits, four walks, and four runs while setting the side down in order just twice (though reported as 163 pitches, Baseball Reference’s play-by-play accounts for “only” 155). Clinging to a 5-4 lead in the ninth, he yielded a leadoff single to Cesar Geronimo and a one-out walk to Pete Rose. After a visit from manager Darrell Johnson, he survived Ken Griffey’s 400-foot drive to deepest center field, recovering to induce Joe Morgan to pop out and evening the series at 2-2.

That start lined Tiant up to pitch a potential Game 7, but with a Red Sox loss in Game 5, a travel day, and then three straight days of rain in Boston, Johnson brought him back for Game 6. After four scoreless innings, he wore down, allowing three runs in the fifth, two in the seventh, and then a Geronimo solo homer to lead off the eighth, putting the Red Sox down 6-3. “El Tiante had left in the top of the inning to what apparently was to be the last of his 1975 ovations; he who had become the conquering king had been found to be just a man, and it seemed so certain. Autumn had been postponed for the last time,” wrote Gammons. Summer got a reprieve, however, when Bernie Carbo’s pinch-hit three-run homer in the bottom of the eighth tied the game before Fisk won it in the 12th.

Tiant made his third All-Star team and finished fifth in the Cy Young voting in 1976 on the strength of a 21-12, 3.06 ERA season. Though the Red Sox were going nowhere, he made eight starts and threw six complete games from September 3 onward. Six of those turns came on three days of rest, including a 12-inning effort on October 3, the season’s final day, when he got a no-decision in a 15-inning win. Sadly, in a two-day span in December 1976, Tiant’s parents — still staying in Milton, Massachusetts near their son — both passed away. His father died of cancer on December 10, and his mother of a heart attack two days later, the day before her husband’s scheduled memorial.

Dissatisfied by the Red Sox’s refusal to raise his $180,000 salary or work out an extension for 1978 while others around him reaped the first riches of the free agent era — particularly reliever Bill Campbell, whom the team signed to a $1 million deal — Tiant held out for 18 days during spring training in 1977. “They signed Carl Yastrzemski in five minutes and gave him what he wanted. Yet, I’ve been going through this bull for three months. I’m not asking for millions — just what I earned,” he said. The Red Sox had extended him just the year before, and took a hardline stance; many writers upbraided him. After securing an extension covering 1978, he reported to camp, and readied himself in time to pitch the season’s fifth game. Following a solid April, he allowed 24 runs in 19.1 innings in May, didn’t lower his ERA below 5.00 for good until his final start in August, and finished at 4.53 (100 ERA+), accompanied by a 12-8 record and a full-season low of three complete games.

Not ready to be written off, the 37-year-old Tiant put together his last great season in 1978, going 13-8 with a 3.31 ERA (126 ERA+) and 5.6 WAR; he threw 12 complete games and 212.1 innings, 23.2 more than the previous year. On August 16, he notched his 200th win via a six-hitter against the Angels. That season, the Red Sox blew a 10-game lead over the Yankees, but Tiant emptied the tank, throwing 56.2 innings with a 3.02 ERA over nine starts from August 27 onward. He threw a two-hit shutout on September 6 against the Orioles, but also took early exits in back-to-back starts on September 15 and 19, failing to retire any of the four Tigers he faced in the latter. Both starts were on three days of rest, as were his next three, all wins; prior to his September 23 victory in Toronto, he declared, “If we lose today, it will be over my dead body. They’ll have to leave me face down on the mound.” Heading into the final day of the schedule, the Red Sox needed another win over the Blue Jays coupled with a Yankees loss to force a one-game tiebreaker. Tiant held up his end with a two-hit shutout. The Yankees did lose, but Bucky Dent’s three-run homer carried the day in the tiebreaker game.

A free agent that winter, the 38-year-old Tiant received just a one-year offer from the Red Sox, reportedly around $225,000. The Yankees swooped in with a two-year deal worth $500,000 — a $100,000 signing bonus and then salaries of $200,000. They also included a 10-year, $20,000 post-career contract to serve as the team’s Director of Latin Affairs, a fancy name for a scouting position. His Red Sox teammates were devastated, with Yastrzemski telling reporters, “They tore out our heart and soul.”

Tiant’s first year with the Yankees was solid (13-8, 3.91 ERA, 2.4 WAR in 195.2 innings), but the team fell short of the postseason for the only time during the 1976-81 span. They won 103 games and the AL East in 1980, but Tiant’s season was a frustrating one. Removed after 7 2/3 innings of three-hit shutout work while holding a four-run lead against the Blue Jays on May 30, he dropped the ball on the mound instead of handing it to first-year manager Dick Howser, then threw his glove into the stands in anger while departing the field. Howser fined him $500 (the maximum that wouldn’t trigger a grievance), and owner George Steinbrenner told the public “I love Looey” but reiterated that the organization backed Hoswer “1,000 percent” — a sentiment that apparently no longer held when he axed the manager after the Royals swept the Yankees in the ALCS.

Tiant, for his part, maintained that he did no wrong but expressed remorse. Soon he missed nearly five weeks due to an adductor strain. He finished 8-9 with a 4.89 ERA and became a free agent at season’s end. He didn’t sign another contract until February 1981, when he inked a minor league deal with the Pirates, whose concern about the possible players’ strike led them to stash him at Triple-A Portland, the same spot from which he’d been called up in 1964. He went 13-7 with a 3.82 ERA, and threw a no-hitter, a one-hitter, and a three-hitter. When the strike ended, he joined the Pirates, but went just 2-5 with a 3.92 ERA in nine starts.

According to the pitcher, Tiant’s agent Paul George spent more than $5,000 on phone calls trying to line up work for his client for 1982, but the Red Sox rejected a proposal for him to join their Pawtucket affiliate alongside a rehabbing Mark Fidrych. Still unemployed as of mid-April, he took a deal with the Tabasco Banana Pickers of the Mexican League, then in August joined the Angels. He won two of his first three starts, including an eight-inning, two-run showing against the Red Sox, but didn’t pitch after September 4 due to a pulled right hamstring, finishing 2-2 with a 5.76 ERA. He spent 1983 with the Mexico City Reds and Leones de Yucatan of the Mexican League, and dusted off his mitt in 1989 to join the Senior Professional Baseball Association, which featured eight teams made up of retired major leaguers. In a trade from the Winter Haven Super Sox to the Gold Coast Suns, Tiant was exchanged for outfielder Ralph Garr and 500 Teddy Ruxpin bears to be used in a promotional giveaway.

Following his playing career, Tiant scouted for the Yankees in Mexico, served as a minor league pitching coach with the Dodgers (1992–95) and White Sox (’97), and as Nicaragua’s pitching coach for the ’96 Summer Olympics in Atlanta. From 1998–2001, he was the head coach for the Division III Savannah (Georgia) College of Art and Design. In 2002, he rejoined the Red Sox, first serving as the pitching coach for the Red Sox’s A-level Lowell Spinners affiliate, then as a broadcaster for the team’s Spanish Baseball Network from ’02–03, and thereafter as a special assignment instructor.

In 2009, Tiant was the subject of a documentary, The Lost Son of Havana, that covered his return to Cuba after a 46-year exile. Produced by the Farrelly Brothers (of Dumb and Dumber fame) and directed by Emmy winner Jonathan Hock, the poignant film contrasted his stateside heroics with a reckoning of all that he left behind.

Eligible for election to the Hall of Fame on the 1988 BBWAA ballot, Tiant received 30.9%, well short of the necessary 75% but hardly without promise, particularly with Hunter (224-166, 3.26 ERA) elected just the previous year, and Jim Bunning (224-184, 3.27 ERA) receiving 70%; the latter reached 74.2% on the same ballot that Tiant debuted.

However, Yastrzemski and Johnny Bench debuted on the 1989 ballot and were elected with ease, while Bunning fell back to 63.3% and Tiant slipped to 10.5%. The problem was that on that same ballot, Gaylord Perry and Fergie Jenkins debuted, both with more robust resumés in terms of statistics and honors. Both were elected in 1991, while Jim Palmer was elected in 1990. After Jenkins’ election, it would take until 2011 for another starter with fewer than 300 wins (Blyleven) to gain entry via the writers. Tiant was left by the wayside while “That Seventies Group” reshaped expectations for Hall starters’ credentials. He never surpassed 20% after his first year, topping out at 18% in his 2002 finale. In three appearances on expanded Veterans Committee ballots (2005, ’07, ’09), he maxed out at 25%, and in three subsequent appearances on Era Committee ballots (Golden Era in 2011 and ’14, Modern Baseball in ’18), he never broke out of the “received __ or fewer votes” pack.

By the traditional measures, Tiant’s three All-Star selections is light for a strong Hall candidate. Conjecture about 1968 balloting aside, he never placed higher than fourth in the Cy Young voting, and while he did win two ERA titles, he doesn’t have much else in the way of black ink (league leads in key categories). His 97 on Bill James’ Hall of Fame Monitor score — which gives credit for awards, league leads, postseason performance, and other things that largely aren’t captured by WAR and other advanced statistics, with 100 being “a good possibility” and 130 “a virtual cinch” — is lower than his enshrined contemporaries, as well as fellow outsider Tommy John:

Tiant fares better via advanced metrics. He ranked in his league’s top 10 in WAR eight times, and in ERA+ seven times. Still, he’s on the lower side of That Seventies Group in terms of key traditional stats and S-JAWS, the adjusted version of my Hall fitness metric that tones down the impact of high-volume innings totals from earlier eras. The newer version jumps him from 59th overall to 43rd; meanwhile, he’s 45th in career WAR and in adjusted peak.

In introducing S-JAWS, I noted that Tiant is below the standard — the average of all enshrined starters — but basically at the median (53.6). While he doesn’t particularly stand out within his cohort, he’s got much stronger advanced stats than Hunter (who nonetheless had a Cy Young and five championships going for him) and Kaat (a Cy Young winner but a compiler whose lengthy broadcast career helped his 2022 Era Committee election). His S-JAWS equals or surpasses some other enshrinees whose careers overlapped, such as Don Drysdale (53.7), Juan Marichal (53.2), Bunning (51.4), Ford (45.5), Sandy Koufax (44.2), and Jack Morris (37.4), but those pitchers all have higher Monitor scores, with Bunning (98) the only other one below 100. The enshrined starters he outranks in S-JAWS mostly had shorter careers in earlier eras, where innings totals were higher and runs even more scarce.

I’ve wavered on Tiant, mainly in light of older versions of JAWS and in direct comparison to his Era Committee competition, because even beyond the numbers his case hasn’t always jumped out. On my virtual 2018 Modern Baseball ballot, I tabbed Marvin Miller, Alan Trammell, and Ted Simmons, but left my fourth slot empty because I didn’t see any of the other seven candidates (Tiant, John, Morris, Steve Garvey, Don Mattingly, Dale Murphy, and Dave Parker) as strong enough. Morris was elected, but Tiant is by far the strongest of that group by JAWS if not more traditional reckonings. If I had a do-over, factoring in his cultural importance as one of the most high-profile Cuban player success stories, from battling racism in the minors after being cut off from his family to his mid-career comeback and emergence as a folk hero, I’d consider him more strongly — but including him on that 2018 ballot would hinge upon how much extra weight to give John for his own comeback via the pioneering elbow surgery that bears his name.

Tiant will be eligible for inclusion on this winter’s Classic Baseball ballot but would likely compete for votes with 2022 near-miss Dick Allen and several overlooked Negro Leagues stars. Still, whether he’s inside or outside the Hall, “El Tiante” left a mark on the game that is unlikely to be forgotten.